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What Spices Go With Which Foods? A Spice Combination Chart

What Spices Go With Which Foods? A Spice Combination Chart
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Do you have a shelve full of spices you struggle to put into other use? This one glance spice combinations chart gives you ideas on how to reuse them by spice pairings them with other foods and make different meals. 

How to combine spices with food
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If you happen to hoard herbs and spices and are not sure of how to reuse them by combining them with other foods then this Spice Combinations Chart will give you ideas and suggestions to reuse spices and pair them with other ingredients to make different meals.

Forgotten, unused or left-over spices tend to lose their identity and potency over time.

Do not underestimate the power of these miracle flavour shots.

They may just come handy to rescue your bad kitchen day!!

Why Should You Reuse Spices?

Most of us will have bottles or packs of spices or herbs laying in the kitchen pantry enjoying their little cozy place in the darkness not having to do any work! (wish I had a life like that)

Keeping opened spices for a long period of time makes them lose their flavour potency . There is a recommended shelf life of spices for optimum flavour.

So if you have them it is best to use spices in everyday cooking.

Using spices adds versatility to cooking and if used correctly they adapt well to the dish you add them to.

All you need to know is the how to to cook with spices to bring out the best flavours in a dish.

This Spice Combinations Chart will help you take little steps and show you what spices go well with what vegetables, meats and other ingredients.

How To Combine Spices & Seasonings

Spice are one of the most versatile cooking ingredients. The function of spices in a meal is to add flavour.

What I mean by this is that the choice of adding one or not is entirely yours.

Few people like spicy and hot food and are happy to add a bail of chilli powder to their dish (which I personally think kills the flavour of other ingredients completely) while others may like the subtle aroma and flavour of cardamom, cloves, or cinnamon.

When it comes to combining spices with other ingredients for example with chicken, fish, beans, quinoa etc, or other spices or herbs such as nutmeg, saffron etc its best to start with adding small quantities to the dish you wish to make.

The infographic below shows the 4 steps you can follow to make different meals using the spice to ingredients combination method.

That is instead of choosing your raw food first you select the spices you wish to use and create a dish around the key spices and seasonings.

Not many may agree with this method as normally you choose your raw ingredients first and then follow a recipe, but the goal here is to reuse spices that you already have instead of buying new one and creating a dish out of it.

How to combine spices and make food pairings infograghic

Spice Pairing With Foods

Let us learn pairing spices with other ingredients with an example.

Let us say that I have few cloves, cinnamon and cumin seeds lying in my cupboard from a Lamb Curry made few days ago.

Referring to the spice combination chart below I can see that cloves, cinnamon and cumin seeds can be used to make soup, rice, stews or curries.

Since I have already made a lamb curry, I try to make another new dish with these chosen spices. And so I choose to make soup.

For a basic aromatic veg soup I stir fry chosen vegetables (carrots, onions and tomatoes) with a tsp of cumin seeds. The next step will be to add the broth and when it all comes to a boil, I throw in 2 cloves and a small stick of cinnamon and leave it to simmer for some time until done.

Before blending the soup, it is always advisable to remove chunky whole spices.

In the example above I managed to use the spices and also made a yummy aromatic carrot and tomato soup with hardly any additional effort.

So what are the steps that I took to combine spices with other foods:

  1. I picked the spices I wished to use first.
  2. I referred to the spice combination chart to see what types of dishes can be made with the chosen spices.
  3. I selected the raw materials that pairs well with the spices.
  4. I cooked a meal with my spices and food pairing.

The kind or type of spices or the quantity of spice you use depends on your personal and family preference.

If you do not like cinnamony taste in soups then choose not to use it, go for green cardamon instead.

It is amazing at how versatile and easy spices can be to work with.

There are different types of spices and herbs used for cooking for you to choose from.

You need to use your personal or household preference and make a judgement about what spices you like best with meat, veg or combined with other spices.

The Spice Combinations Chart below illustrates few spice pairing suggestions and tips.

The chart will help you decide what spices go well with vegetables, meat and other ingredients and the type of dishes or meals you can make with the extra spices you have.

A One Glance Spice Combinations Chart

Use this guide and the chart below as a starting point to begin with experimentation with some of the good spices you have.

There are no limits to making good spice combinations and flavour pairings.

Feel free to make your own spice and flavour combos as you become more used to the taste.

Spice combinations chart

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To Conclude and Recap

Left over spices will lose their flavour if not used. The best way to reuse spices is to combine them with other ingredients and make different meals.

Since there is no ‘Right Way’ of combining spices as such, it gives you the flexibility to use spices and ingredients you and your family enjoy.

Use the 4 step spice to ingredient method and refer to the spice combination chart above for ideas on meals you could be treating your family with.

Do you have spices laying in the cupboard that you are not sure what to do with? Let me know if I can help in any way. 

Suggested Relevant Posts

Top 10 spices to have in your pantry to make meals under 30 minutes. 

Struggle with finding Indian spices? Use these spice substitutes instead. 

 

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Christopher Cunningham
Christopher Cunningham
1 year ago

I’m so happy I found this site. I’ve only been cooking Indian food for six months. There’s so much to learn and so far it’s been a magical journey. One question about the chart, where does cayenne fit in or is that chilli to you?

Julia
Julia
1 year ago

This is a great chart, but how do I print it? I have saved it, I have copied it but print seems to be blocked

Predrag Kovačević
Predrag Kovačević
1 year ago

Thank you for sharing with us such a comprehensive article. I was planning for a while now to bring more spices to my diet. This should save me a bunch of time

Nava
3 years ago

This is so helpful! I always end up with tons of leftover spices that I don’t know what to do with because a recipe calls for 1 tsp.

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